Core of Nation - Invasion Tour: 20080203
Day 4 -Back to Sweden
After a good night sleep, and waking up 1 hour too early due to my cell-phone still showing swedish time, we pay the bill and pack the car. Bo from the band Tobias and his soon to be wife Annette were going to buy us real english breakfast! We drive to the outskirts of Doncaster where theres a park and a cozy breakfast joint, inside you could see guest eating from huge plates with lots of food, and I'm starving since yesterday night so Bo and I go for the real english breakfast el grande, while the others go for the more modest dishes from the menu. We chat and they have a lot of interesting things to say, about there house, about their music pub they had before, about there soon to be wedding and her daughter helping out other bands with the merchandise. It makes me feel ok when I hear a fellow musician spending a little too much money on music gadgets and instruments, because I do exactly the same thing. My last gadget is always my last one until I buy the next.In my cellar I got everything from organ, synths, drumkit, and small PA etc etc, the only thing I lack is time. And it's hard finding time to do music with a regular day-job and four kids, so the four days in england has certainly been a blessing I think for all of us before returning to our everyday life back home here in sweden. We then say goodbye, and we thank Tobias and his soon to be wife Annette for a great breakfast and the chat. We then head towards Manchester Airport and the road the navigator guide us through is just amazing driving past high hills and small picturesque towns and a lot of sharp bends. A lot of time to kill in the airport but a pint of beer eases the wait. The flight back home was a piece of cake compared to when we arrived at england a few days back. Dropping off the others on the way home from the airport. Arrive home at about half past eleven , and chatted with my wife and me oldest daughter turning 18 this summer. My 3 other kids are in bed already and won't be seeing them until monday night:( I ask my wife 'bout letting me go on another mini tour to England and she gives me a super-gogo! without any hesitation even if it means stealing days from our family vacation. We thank everybody who made this mini tour possible, and also thank everybody who came to watch us! I'm really sorry for my english grammar and spelling, but I hope some of what I've written makes some sense to y'all. And we totally are longing to come back again.
Oscar Nossborn, Core of Nation
Core of Nation - Invasion Tour: 20080202
Day 3 -Doncaster, Hall Cross Bar
After our coffee and tea in the morning made by Jon himself which he normally never does for any band, (again, it's got to be Hanks magic in work?) we say our goodbyes and head towards Doncaster. But the night before we heard some rumours that the owner of Hall Cross, Gary was a bit of a ruffneck and a tough guy that takes no shit from anyone. We usually are very considerate as individuals and also as a band so we thought we didn't have much to worry. But after hearing one story after another from various sources about other bands and his temper, we began to feel a bit weary. Our plan was to keep a low profile and do things about in shinobi style.
We had no problem finding the Hotel Caribbean on Thorne Road, Doncaster thanks to the navigator.We would surely recommend this hotel to others and it's cheap but has room usually associated with price ranges above. We unload our stuff and head towards the city center to have something to eat. The weather is grey and cold wind whips you in the face. Everybody is hungry and a bit grumpy, so we're desperate for a nice place to eat. After walking about in half an hour without finding a welcoming joint we throw ourselves in a deep, narrow and a dark lunch joint. We're not familiar with the jargon there but we immediatly feel out of place and regretful, but I guess we'll have to eat here this time then. A guy from behind the counters hollar at you saying:-"kidney or liver?"-(one of us)"excuse me?"-"kidney or liver pie?"-(damma in swedish) "† fyyfaan!"-"wha will u ave then?"-(Rolf) "Do you serve any fish here?"-"naa no no no...."-(one of us)"well thank you very much then"and we then can make a safe retreat without looking like goofs. Just across the square we finally take a chance on a spanish joint where we are serverd nice paellas, hamburgers and a veggie pizza for Rolf ... oh yes, and beer of course.
Back at the hotel we all take a break, some taking shower (together perhaps?... I don't know) some taking a nap, I myself took a hot bath and polished my boots and guitar for tonight. Practiced some chops, went down to check them out... still sleeping .... more practice. Everybody is getting ready and we're all prepared for a battle. We load the car which has become a long and cumbersome procedure, if you don't pack the stuff in the right order you have start all over again. We park the car in a slot that becomes idle just when we arrive, and we unload our gears. The pub is on a busy street with lots of traffic and a lot of people are out on the streets.
Inside we go straight to the stage where the backline and PA are already prepared. So you look around and I think that this pub is one of the biggest pubs I've played on, reminds me of Pub Anchor here in Stockholm, very familiar and there are some guests already having thier pint. You look at the gear on stage and you make a few adjustment to suit your needs. This time we moved Dammas Amp as far back as we can to give Hank some monitoring, and hightened the screamer combo a couple more inches. I think Rickard touched some cables going into the DI pedal on top of small bass amp connected to a mini PA when an earsplitting cracle was heard in the monitors. This is the first time and the only time Gary marched towards us hollaring, I almost took a nice crap right there on stage, but after that he was a really good sport. He made us feel very welcome and relaxed. The soundcheck went really well and I heard myself more than enough, Hank wanted a little more Damma so we gave him more Damma.The wall on the DJ booth was directly behind my combo and that helped direct the sound where I wanted it... towards my ears, Tobias did a excellent job mixing and adjusting the sound.
All of the headbangers from the night before ware there with a few alterations. And Mark and Gary told us when we could start. Gary told us to play as much as possible and to play past midnight even if it meant starting over with the set list. The first set went ok , we knew we could do better, and in the break we had a laugh , beer and spoke to some very cool locals as well. The word of mouth has spread about Hank and everybody's after his sexy body. We start the second set and we nail everything at least that's how I felt. Rolf is on fire and is performing like a beast, I stare at the audience not hiding under my fretboard, Damma is meaner than ever, Rickard is rock solid and Hank is pounding on like there's no tomorrow.Unlike the other two venues the covers we play are welcomed by the crowd, "I Look into your eyes" penetrates your mind, and we prolong the ending of couple of songs. Oh and by the way Hank played a drum-solo requested by the crowd!
After the set everybody seemed pleased, Gary was happy and he said he liked the sabbath medley, and that we are welcome to play there again... we will and with pleasure! Now when the show was over there is only one chance left for everyone to get a piece of Sexy-Hank, he runs and he hides but he get cornered and everyone gets a piece of the action. All the CD's gets sold-out and a lot of T-shirts as well thanks to Annette's daughter Caffrin (I'm so bad with names, sorry if I messes up), she borrowed us her drum set also... geez thanks! Annette and Bo(Tobias) invites us for breakfast. We said a last few words to Mark and Chris and we drove off to find a place to eat. We find a small joint for takeaway and order lots of greasy food to go. We eat ourselves full in Dammas and Rickards room, and talk about the evening. It's late and we go to bed.
Core of Nation - Invasion Tour : 20080201
Day 2 -Bury, Hark to Towler
After about an hour of driving we find ourselves in Bury and a Pub called Hark to Towler, the first thing that strikes you when enter is the awesome decorations, you've never seen anything quite like this in any pub before. We knew before hand that the pub was going to be in pirates theme, but this was just mesmerizing, I am usually too shy to take pictures but now I was taking pictures of the interior with my cell-phone and Rolf was shooting better pics with his camera. I am eagerly waiting for those pics from Rolf to show my wife... We meet the owner, introduces ourselves, bring our gears and bags in and from this moment on we're in for a pleasant treat. The owner Jon is a very sympathetic guy and as soon we all start talking you feel kind of sad in secret, thinking why aren't we blessed with a few Jons back home. A guy that really burns for the music (and pirates especially Pirates of the Carribean series). Jon has so many stories to tell you, that we are really interested in ranging from music to just about anything, like his encounters with Lemmy before Lemmy moved to LA, and about the music scene around the area. Jon has a cool dog that never gets tired of fetching the ball and if there's no ball around she'll expect you to play fetch ball with a beer mat! A very relentless fine dog indeed. Jon lends his own room for us to use as a dressing room and to sleep in for the night.
Mark and Chris arrives with the gear and so does Killheaten (thanks for letting us borrow your gear!), we do a short soundcheck and we are even more ready than the night before. We just wanted to proove that we could do even better. We also made a promise amongst ourselves not to order any beer before the gig, so when we went out for dinner, we ended in a fine chinese restaurant just up the road drinking nothing but coke. But before finding the chinese place we unwillingly ended up in Bolton, another town nearby, just to be able to turn the car around when we drove too far past the Co-op and the ATM first time around.This time around Mark and Chris bought some cool headbangers to support the both bands unconditionally, Mike, Luke, Nick and Chris? kill me if I messed up thier names or mail us and we'll correct the facts. They definately showed us all what headbanging and Metal is all about. Killheaten was blasting away with thier gut wrenching metal and to me they even sounded better tonight.
Mark was kind enough to record some of the songs with the camcorder and brought us the DVD the very next day(thanks). Rolf as always, ever since I've been in this band shows what showmanship is all about! He even kept on going wihout a hiccup after tripping on Rickard and landing on his head with his feet flying up in the air! (and singin hey diddle diddle with a kitty in the middle and swing like you didn't care). now that's showmanship! Rickard's got great stage-presence and is flerting with the crowd all the time. Damma is happy and is enjoying every moment of the gig(he'll later get banged for this from a really really cool character). Hank is doing his best trying to hear us wihout any stage monitors, lesson learned and for Hall Cross we put damma's amp waaay back facing Hank so he could hear what the rest of were doing on stage.
To our delight jon loved what he heard. After the gig the bands, the Appletons and Jon thanked each other, and we were very thankful for letting us play here. We order ourselves some beer, Damma offered me rum, it was very nice (I owe you one Damma). We talked to a couple of people but one in particular was very honest and frank, his name was David. He said that he couldn't hear us the first couple of songs but after that the sound was superb and no one escaped our sound. He had a few pointers for Rolf telling him to mean what he sings and to act even more crazy. David told Damma that he shouldn't look so happy on stage. He said that our sound was made for big arenas (thanks). It was good advice, and even if he was a punk rocker (loving the Damned and reheased next door to Pete Shelley long time ago) we knew he meant it and we knew that he had a good point.He was also fun to be with, and even after the pub closed , us, jon and david with his good looking sister had a really funny and entertaining chat. Thanks again Jon! and his family for taking good care of us!
Core of Nation - Invasion Tour: 20080131
Day 1 Manchester -Grand Central
After the bumpiest and most frightening landing any of us had, and a couple of "just in case" sincere confessions made by some of us (like loving to dance or coming out of the closet which all were taken back later on) we arrive at Manchester Airport.
We then literally destroy the brand new interior of the rental car by cramming in all our gear in the medium sized luggage compartment. We then wander about in the car park to find ourselves out, remember we're from sweden and in sweden we drive on the right side of the road and here everyone's f****n' driving on the wrong side! So after the scary flight, we now have a scary drive ahead and all our heads are swiftly looking in both directions.... bejeeesus roundabout after roundabout we start to get comfortable with our drummer Hank's (as H from now on) driving (I know! what band lets their drummer drive, well let me tell you one more thing, our drummer takes care of the bands finances too, so for those of you who haven't met him let me tell you that everyone just falls in love with him and thats both gals and pals :) he can even knock off price for an orange juice from a flight attendant?!!? for christ sake, thats how charming and sexy he is:)).
Our GPS-navigator shows us where our venue for the first night is: Grand Central on Oxford street in Man-city. This place is a real rock bar/pub with a stage in one corner and a pool table in the other and a jukebox loaded with hardrock and metal ... well they have some Francesco Zappalini in there as well. After talking to a nice young guy who later turned out to be the manager, we went out for a stroll in Man-city to grab a bite and visit the store that sells Dr. Martins boots on Market Street. We got something to bite even though some of us weren't satisfied with our food (daddy always told me if you don't see anyone eating in the joint go somewhere else, and now I know) , and when we found the shoe store it was out of business:(
As we return to Grand Central we drink a couple of beers and listen to the jukebox, Damma (D from now on) chose a couple of Metallica and Pantera songs, Rolf (R from now on) chose Frank Zappa amongst others, Rickard (RD from now on) I think chose ACDC and whatnot, I myself chose Arch Enemy and Damageplan.
Nodding off now and then and a few beers later the Appletons and their crew arrives with the gear... hmmm and also a exotic pretty young lady but the type that just makes you nervous was helping out, she'll later play a role in incident 1. We are introduced to Mark and Chris and thier crew and you feel good from the relaxed atmosphere that Grand Central and the Appletons represents.
The other bands arrive: Hollow Point and Killheathen. The sound check went smooth without any complication, ...well except that I had a hard time finding a tight bottomed sound that I'm used to on the ENGL Screamer combo but I later found a nice creamy sound that was very suitable for leads thanks to Mark.
The other bands played their set , and they were just awesome! Hollow Point , really young lads with virtuosity to be envious about with powerfull songs that knocks your teeth off.
Killheathen really cool looking power trio with great songs and awesome singer like if they are already signed to a major label, very modern sounding groovy metal. What does this add up to? Well as for me I get intimidated and get nervous , I don't know about the rest of the band but I start to wonder "What the hell am I doing here", when I could be at home in the sofa having a nice can of beer watching some horror movie with my wife and kids..... Stop stop right there mister Oscar! Just take another sip from the pint and lets give them all we got. And we did, aside from a few goofs from me (sry bandmates) we gave the crowd something they've never experienced before, the crowd was Core of NationaliZed and it will take some time for them to be Core of deNationaliZed! The crowd was nice to us and very responsive, we got a lot of positive responses afterwards.
Incident 1 - Hank with the "Will of Steel" or "Character from Heaven"
Whilst the other bands were loading thier gear we were taking pictures and socializing and drinking beer. Having a chat with various people from the crowd commenting our performance.... You remember that good looking exotic lady? well she and another girl gothic by the looks of her both around twenty something, both looking good starts to fool around with our drummer Hank, stealing his sticks, painting his lips black and what not. As nice as Hank is he really is a sitting duck for these sexy prowlers in the night. As time go by and the night get darker and darker they start to fool around with each other instead of H, maybe because they felt the lack of response from Hank. We indeed have some pictures to proove thier agenda. And they were indicating very openly that they wanted to take our little drummer home with them down the road..... ooops.... -"I just live over there at Sansbury street, come home with me and we'll have sex." Nervously, feeling cornered by these prowlers, H takes another sip from his beer and says with his swedish accent: -"Thank you, but no thanks , I think I will pass this time thank you, I'm sorry but I'm sleeping with Rolf tonight." And we all burst out in laughter!!!, and now we have new fuel to feed the flames in our drummers slightly homofobic manners.
Incident 2 - Rickard ....secretly has the hots for Hank!
The Pub was closed by now, but you could still see a lot movement on the streets. Chris is left and so's the manager, Tony, and we're told that food is ordered so there is no need for us to eat out, thanks again Grand Central. As the food arrives the manager pours us beer , and we get into heavy socializing. It is moments like these, that really makes me wish that I was living in some metro-city and not a little village with one gas station and one small super market:( The za's and the fried chickens are honey in our mouth and the boddington tastes too good to be true. We each take turn to query about each others culture and you learn a lot that's never mentioned in any books. A shot of J„ger is served, and I start to feel really dizzy , so I have to turn down an offer on another beer, and start drinking water instead. Only thing I dislike about my japanese genes are related to alcohol:) So we all give in for the night except Chris and Tony, hope they didn't think of us as wuss:) but we were up since 03:00AM. Grand Central was kind enough to let us sleep in the PUB's living room upstairs and a cozy separate luv-bedroom for the sake of Rolf and Hanks privacy:)
The rest of this incident is, as, was told to us by Chris and Tony: So the band's all asleep upstairs right... and Chris and the Manager are playing pool as hardcore as they are. And suddenly Rickard wanders down the stairs half naked or let's say butt naked for the sake of the story through the bar in to the pub ,first into the mens room for a while, then he goes into the ladies room for a while , then he looks into the storage room and scratches his head like old Einstein himself. Chris and the Manager has been observing him during this whole procedure, saying nothing and with thier faces looking like small bird houses, and they are wondering, what in bloody hell is he up to?!!? So they pop the question at last: -"Hey mate, is everything alright?!?" Rickard answers them back with a dazed look in his eyes: -"Hank... hick.. Hank! I'm looking for Hank, where is he!" Hahaha, now we know that Rickard has a tendency of sleep-walking when he gets overtired and drunk but his response to Chris's question????, my theory is that Hank once again prooves that he is oozing of "kavorka/kovorka" (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=kavorka for those of you who missed one episode of Seinfeld). Well be sure as hell that this incident was another gallon of fuel squirting on the flames of Hanks small (very small) homofobic manners:) Next morning after having breakfast at Mickey D and coffee at Waynes, we all say goodbye and as cool as the Tony is he also slips into the web of Hank's Kavorka and kisses Hank on the hand :) Thanks Grand Central once again for a very very kind and unforgetable hospitality (contempory usage of the word of course)! We pack our bags ,gears and head towards Bury, our next venue where a great pleasant surprise lurs ahead...